Join the Beccues For A Year-Long Adventure of Service and Exposure Around the World.

Welcome to our website. Through our virtual “suitcase”, we hope that you could come along with us on this trip, in the comfort of your home while we do the “roughing it” for you. Many of you who are reading this site are probably family (hi mom & dad!). Most of you are friends. A few of you might have stumbled upon this site while you are surfing the net (nice to meet you anyways - a hearty handshake to you.) No matter who you are, we hope you could share the experiences with us vicariously, and if you feel like it, drop us a few lines of feedback. We would love to hear from you.

Who we are:

We, the Beccues, are a family of four, living in beautiful, sunny Southern California (near Los Angeles). Phil, the head of the household, is a Decision Analyst who just resigned his rewarding position at Baxter International in order to make this family adventure a reality. No, this was not a mid-life crisis impulsive-type move, but a thoughtfully pondered and carefully weighed decision with difficult tradeoffs. Sophia, a wife, full-time homeschool mom, and artist of some sort (depends on her mood), dreamed of going around the world with her (future) family while back in college days. But, now she’s not sure whether to feel excited or terrified. As our departure day gets closer, the courage is shrinking, so now is the best time to go before all the courage drains away. Timothy, a 15 year-old, is going to be a freshman in high school. He earned his frequent flyer mile status before he turned ONE year old. Reluctantly, he is giving up his cello playing for a year to come on this trip because his parents are too tight to buy an extra plane ticket for his cello. Since the adults in this family are technically challenged, he’s going to be the person you thank for maintaining this website for you (or blame if there’s any problem). Alyssa, 12, is going to be in 7th grade and will be a trooper even being the youngest. She is sacrificing her beloved Wawa (whom she sleeps with every night) and her cozy room, but is excited to bring her flute with us. She is looking forward to buying lots of souvenirs around the world (with her own money, of course).

Why the trip:

When we tell people about our trip, we generally get two strong reactions, “That’s incredible, a trip of a lifetime!” or “You quit your job now to travel; are you nuts?”

Well, we considered both possibilities long and hard before we came to the decision to carry out this idea. The first question we asked ourselves is “Why are we doing this?”

We want to build a strong family bond and share a unique memory.

We want to see the world together to learn to appreciate different people and cultures.

We recognized our incredible privilege to live where we live, so we want to get out of our “Disneyland of the world” setting, and experience the “real world”.

We want to give our children a perspective to help shape their future.

We want to gain a fresh appreciation to what we’ve stopped seeing.

We want to grow in our faith, allowing God to be more “visible” in our lives.

We want to learn to shift our mentality from “it’s all about me” to “it’s not about me.”

We want to size up our hearts for others.

With all that said, we frankly do not know what to expect in this coming year. It’s wildly open! Our lives have never been so planned yet so unpredictable. Through a theme of “service and exposure”, we do hope that at the end of our adventure we would have attained our purpose to some degree

To what are we most looking forward?

Phil: Visiting old friends and making new ones

Sophia: Meeting all different kinds of people

Timothy: Taking lots of pictures with his new camera.

Alyssa: Seeing all different kinds of animals from all over the world, at cool places like an African safari, Australia and the Amazon.

Of what are we most fearful?

Phil: of having to eat unpalatable cuisine (such as grubs or insects) out of politeness.

Sophia: still can’t decide from her hundreds of lists.

Timothy: of having the electronics (computers, cameras, ipod, phones, etc.) stolen or lost.

Alyssa: of getting sick with the disease or being kidnapped.

How did it get started?

We really are not sure how this HUGE endeavor evolved. Most likely it happened three or four years ago on one of those after dinner chats, thinking about what would we do if someone gave us 3 million dollars, or, dreaming up what would we do if we could do anything we want. Whatever was said then, it grew! And, here we go....